Slippery Santorum

Of course, he's not alone: Rick Santorum, in his finely-honed religious outrage against the idea of providing contraceptives, is happy to be quite selective when it comes to what he considers teachings of his church. Like most people, he ignores the ones that don't fit. Find me a biblical literalist in this country who's stoned his kid to death lately, for example. And them fundagelicals smoke them some mighty fine pork ribs, too.

Anyhow, here's a list of a few things the Catholic church, its bishops, its pope, have said at which he's at cross purposes. So to speak. Given his shout-from-the-mountaintops holy-of-holies posturing on contraception, his overlookings are a relevant area of inquiry. Among them:

1. So for instance, Pope John Paul II was against anyone going to war against Iraq I think you’ll find that Rick Santorum managed to ignore that Catholic teaching.

2.The Conference of Catholic Bishops requires that health care be provided to all Americans. I.e., Rick Santorum’s opposition to universal health care is a betrayal of the Catholic faith he is always trumpeting.

3. The Catholic Church opposes the death penalty for criminals in almost all situations. (Santorum largely supports executions.) ...

Oh, and he bucks the Pope on evolution, too.

It's hardly a revelation that you can find support for practically whatever the hell you want in the Bible; nor that, given its countless internal inconsistencies, it'd be literally impossible to find someone who lives entirely by its rules. Which is a really good argument for keeping one's religious beliefs entirely out of our political conversations. And an even better argument for why people like Santorum are so dangerous.

And since I wrote the above, he's gone way further. Give the man points for honesty; in any country but Iran and Saudi Arabia, his love of theocracy would be considered sort of scary. The question is, to how many U.S. voters is it the same? Especially as he misconstrues it. Guess we'll find out.